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In the rise of digitally-made artworks, Emily Hare chooses to trace back her roots and begin picking up what’s left in the shadows: paintbrush and watercolour. So no, what you’re about to see are not some pages off of a children’s book; maybe they will be in the long run, but no — these are Emily’s unusual, delicately-drawn brainchildren brushed softly in watercolour, reimagining unusual characters and mythical creatures to her own art style. If you’re a sucker for both cray and creamy-looking masterpieces, then Emily’s works will surely put your artsy-fartsy soul in satisfaction. Let’s go take a look.

1. Tree G’Nom: The Fuzzy Pal in the Woods

“I have never been one to boldly slap down dark lines in pencil, I like to start very softly… so softly that if I am recording this process its’ near impossible for the camera to see! I treat pencil similarly to how I treat watercolour, in a way that means I am not married to the line I have just made and can generally rub it out easily! This of course results in a very soft looking finish. “

2. Wiffle: The Cuddly Crawly

“Looking at how strange and odd looking nature can be is helpful, although this doesn’t stop me tending to lean towards certain shapes that I like or arrangement of facial features I seem to do a lot!”

3. Craggle: The Bulbasaur in Watercolor

“This creature I made called The Craggle, which is the caterpillar form of a type of fairy from my book Strangehollow that I made last year, eats other caterpillars. Those caterpillars that it eats like to eat a certain type of fungi, so I thought in order for him to lay in wait and be invisible, he needs to have mushroom type growths on his back.”

4. Olwen: The Lady on the Run

“Folklore and fairytales are a huge source of inspiration for me. I can’t really give you a favourite as those often change!

While this isn’t a favourite illustration, It’s a really good example of how I get inspired (sometimes) with the use of a sentence or a paragraph from a story. This one is the Welsh Fairytale ‘The Wooing Of Olwen’.”

5. Werewolf: The Summon of the Night

“I grew up loving illustrated fairytales and all those classic fantasy movies like Labyrinth, Legend, Sinbad The Sailor, Jason and the Argonauts etc. Those monster movies were the best! Creatures is definitely a theme in my work but I also lean towards the old heroic tales too, like Beowulf.”

6. Witch: The Serene Spellbinder

“Certainly when I’m ‘seeing’ the things in my mind, whether it be a painting or a creature or character I have an idea for, it never comes out quite how I want it to (very very rarely) on the paper. It’s very difficult to grasp that wisp of a thing that is in your mind and make it as real as it feels on paper as it does in the mind.”

7. Beowulf: The Classic Hero

“Recently I have two pieces of work I’m really proud of and one is the Beowulf. The story behind the Beowulf piece is from the famous poem of Beowulf – if you aren’t familiar with it then I highly recommend if you like stories of absurdly strong and brave heroes!”

8. Howl: The Call of Fear

“[I have this] painting HOWL, that I painted at the end of last year during class with Scott Fischer in Smarter Art School. It is much higher contrast to my usual softer work and I really enjoyed creating it and the process took a really long time. The story behind Howl was a prompt from Month Of Fear last year and that prompt was ‘howl’ and that’s it.”

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